Writing – competitions – resources

Today, I’m writing about writing for competitions! Why bother?

Improving as a writer is an ongoing process. There’s never a time when the learning stops. There’s a lot of truth in the saying, the more you write, the better you become. Providing you keep honing the craft. None of us has achieved perfection – otherwise editors would be out of a job! – so we must persist in writing regularly, often and be critical in our self-editing phase.

That’s all very well if the work runs smoothly and comes to an end. What if you’re stuck for ideas? Or can’t move forward on a particular piece?

One way to recharge the writing machine in you is to leave the current problematic work and try something fresh. An ideal choice is a competition; particularly if the competition has a theme. Competitions have deadlines: that also proves helpful to the writing soul – instilling in us discipline to finish to a deadline.

Throughout the year there are plenty of competitions for writers of short fiction, poetry, and even novels. Some have modest entry fees (about £5 or equivalent), while others are free to enter. Useful resources for being notified about these are the magazines Writers’ Forum and Writing Magazine (revamped to now contain a Writers’ News section).

In addition there are a good number of online sites that alert you.

Here’s a very comprehensive site, definitely worth subscribing to:

http://compsandcalls.com/wp/

Good luck with your writing – and your competition entries!

PS - http://completelynovel.com/articles/how-to-win-a-short-story-competition